Date Point 10y7m AV
The Box, Omaha, Nebraska, USA, Earth
Xiù Chang
There was no longer such a thing as a day off in The Box – after all, they wouldn’t get days off on the ship once it was in flight – but weekends were half days, with the afternoons and evenings there for relaxing and personal improvement. Unscheduled drills aside, they were usually pretty relaxing.
Inevitably, however, life in their tiny shared space wasn’t all paradise. The warning from their evaluators had been right – close proximity and little privacy unavoidably led to friction.
Mostly, it was little things. Even on her best behaviour and with tidying up after themselves being part of their routine three times a day, Allison still had an insuppressible slovenly streak. She tended to just leave her clothes where they fell whenever she undressed, rather than putting them in a laundry hamper that was at most ten feet away. She never made her bed, she just would not do the washing up properly and thoroughly, and she seemed to suffer no embarrassment at all from releasing the occasional cavernous fart, though a minor adjustment to their diet largely resolved that problem.
Julian meanwhile was… well, Xiù’s complaints about Julian were less reasonable, really. How could she fairly complain about her boyfriend being conscientious? Except that he was conscientious to a fault, constantly checking she was okay, trying to cheer her up if she was anything less than perfectly perky. If she was in the mood for it, his concern for her state of mind was touching. If she wasn’t – which was more common – she felt like he thought she was made of glass and cobwebs, ready to shatter and tear at the slightest wave of a hand.
He and Allison weren’t immune to spats and minor fights, either. There was never a raised voice between them, nor did it ever end in anything other than a reassuring kiss and reconciliation, but more days than not involved a minute or two somewhere when the energy between the two of them became strained.
Xiù stepped in one time when they were bickering about, as far as she could tell, nothing much at all. Allison had informed him of something mundane like that she’d refilled the liquid soap in the shower, he – being engrossed in a book about the history of naturalism and taxonomy – had grunted a distracted acknowledgement, she’d followed-up by informing him of which scent of soap she’d chosen and he had quite abruptly pointed out that he was reading.
This had resulted in a tense ten minutes, but the moment Xiù had meekly asked if they were okay, they’d both dropped everything to reassure her that they were absolutely fine and had all but tripped over in apologising to one another.
Later, Allison had opined that minor moments of tension were normal and healthy in a relationship. “After all,” she’d said, “we wouldn’t get upset if we didn’t give a fuck.”
Xiù tried to bear that in mind. For the most part it worked – she found it in her to start rolling her eyes and throwing Allison’s used shirts in the laundry with a smile rather than a frown. She gently confronted Julian and explained that constantly checking on her actually undermined her confidence and mood more often than not. He’d done a pretty good job of toning it down after that.
The real boulder in the road was sex. The revelation that Allison and Julian were permanently stuck on third base was a surprising one.
She and Julian talked about it when they had a rare moment alone together while Allison was out a little later than was usual on a Saturday, taking a couple of tests. Their studies and training for the day were all done, they’d finished the chores, and they were sitting on the couch just talking when that particular nugget of information came to her attention.
“So, you guys have really never gone the whole way?”
“It’s the baby thing.” Julian grumbled. “I mean, that rule’s been there right from the start with us. I guess I shoulda put together what happened with her before that Keating guy dragged it out of her…”
“But… I mean, we both got those implants and you had that, um, that injection…”
Long-term contraception had turned out to be part of the contract. Both the girls now had intramuscular contraceptive implants and Julian had suffered the rather less dignified solution of a vas-occlusive contraceptive injection. In theory, the injection of a sterile occluding foam into his vasa deferentia that would disintegrate naturally in three years, or which could be easily dissolved before then if he wanted, was supposed to be a quick, painless and uncomplicated solution to male contraception.
In practice, he’d spent a day or two walking and sitting in slightly funny ways, and constantly adjusting himself for comfort with a pained expression.
“Yup. 100% no chance of accidental babies whatsoever, and she’s still…” Julian sighed, and scowled at himself. “I mean, I know it’s her choice and if she says she’s closed for business then nobody else gets a vote. It’s just…”
Xiù nodded. “And she keeps hinting about you and me, um…” she tried to fight back her blush, which of course just made it worse.
“See, I don’t mind that.” Julian said. “You’re not ready yet, full stop. You’re not, uh, teasing me with going nearly the whole way and then stopping short, you know?”
“Right! But it really bugs me that she keeps pushing me, when she’s got this big hangup of her own…”
They nodded together and lapsed into thoughtful silence, which Julian broke a minute or two later.
“Should we… be talking about this without her here?” He asked.
“Shouldn’t we?” Xiù asked.
“I dunno, are we maybe talking behind her back? That doesn’t seem right…”
He had a point. “Maybe…” Xiù conceded. “You’re right. I guess I’d be kind of upset if I found out you two had been complaining about me without me…”
Julian gave a shifty clear of the throat. “Agh. Right… Sorry.”
“…You have?”
He raised his hands. “Not like anything major. just…”
“Julian!”
“I’m sorry!” He cleared his throat. “Okay, new rule, no two of us talk about the third when they’re not around”
“I think so!” She agreed.
She relented when Julian shrank a little, looking so much like a kicked puppy it was impossible to stay mad. She leaned over and kissed him. “…Sorry.”
He spread his arms and she scooted over to lie on his chest. He stroked her hair and kissed the top of her head.
“…So I managed to irritate you guys?” She asked, after a while.
“Not really. Nothing important.” He promised.
“What was it about?”
He laugh-sighed. “You’re just gonna worry if I don’t tell you, aren’t you?” When she nodded against him, he nodded too and drew a thoughtful breath through his teeth. “Al was… it was about sparring practice. She felt you weren’t letting her progress fast enough.”
“She’s progressing really fast anyway!” Xiù looked up.
“Yeah, but you know how she is. She doesn’t slow down or relent, does she?”
“Ugh, yeah.” Xiù frowned. “Sometimes I just wanna tell her to…” she caught herself. “Wait, we’re complaining about her again.”
“Ah, shit…” Julian rubbed his scalp with the heel of his hand. “That’s harder in practice than in theory, isn’t it?”
“Well, what was your complaint about me?”
“I don’t have one.”
“Oh come on,” she pushed herself upright. “There’s got to be something I do that annoys you.”
“Only when you’re being insecure,” he said, and smiled cheekily. “Like right now.”
“Sorry…”
He put his thumb and index finger under her chin and lifted her for a kiss. “We’re all fine,” he promised.
Reassured, Xiù snuggled down on his chest again.
She must have dozed off because she knows she’s dreaming. She’s on a grassy mountainside, overlooking a canyon-spanning steel bridge on a bright sunny day.
A dirt bike blitzes past from behind her and out over the bridge, bouncing over the ramps and wooden boards that have been laid on it – Motocross at altitude. As she watches, the rider makes a mistake, over-corrects, wobbles and the next ramp throws them high into the air to fall off the bridge and into the canyon.
Perspective shifts. Now she’s the rider, and she leaps off the bike with a whoop, pulling the cord on her parachute. She takes hold of the steering lines and aims herself down the mountainside. Trees, snow, grass and animals flash by below as she perfectly calculates the angle of descent, thrillingly close to disaster but never crashing. It’s the next best thing to flying.
Both of them woke with a small jump when the door opened. Allison threw her jacket onto the coat hooks, and waved to them. “Hey, lovers.”
“Hey!” Julian sat up.
Xiù stretched and checked the wall clock. They had napped for nearly an hour. Not surprising really, considering how permanently tired they all were from the constant education and training. “Hey…”
Allison hit the fridge and grabbed the orange juice. “Did I wake you?”
“Guess you did…” Julian agreed. “Hey, Al, we’ve kinda come up with a new relationship rule.”
She turned, pouring a glass. “Yeah?”
Xiù nodded. “We were thinking it’s a bad idea if two of us talk about the third when they’re not present.”
Allison blinked at them. “Did I do something to piss you off?”
“No, no. Not… nothing like that.” Julian said. “I was just… we were talking about the whole third-base only thing.”
“And I was saying you’ve been making me a bit uncomfortable lately, hinting about… you know, when I’m gonna be ready.” Xiù added.
Allison put the orange juice back in the fridge, slammed back the glass in one go and put it down. ”‘Hi, Al! How was your day?’” she asked, exuding brittle sarcastic cheer.
“Come on, don’t be like that-” Julian protested, but Allison folded her arms.
“Be like what?” She asked. “I’ve had a shitty day! I came this close to fucking up that bend test I’ve been stressing about all week, I’ve got a head full of system integration jargon that I barely understand, and then the second I’m home, my boyfriend and my girlfriend gang up on me!”
She sighed, picked up her glass and took it to the sink to rinse it. “I’m sorry if I upset you, guys, but couldn’t this have waited? Let me get home and rest up a bit first?”
Xiù and Julian looked at each other awkwardly.
“New rule?” Xiù suggested.
“No ganging up.” Julian agreed.
Al leaned against the sink and tucked her thumbs into her belt loops. “Good rule.” She observed, testily.
“…Sorry Allison.” Xiù offered, while Julian nodded apologetically with her.
“It’s okay, it’s fine-” Allison waved a hand and exhaled. “You just managed to put the cherry on a shitty day cake, you know?”
“Sorry.” Xiù repeated herself. Allison smiled forgivingly, stepped forward, turned and threw herself over the couch’s arm to land with her head in Xiù’s lap.
“Hey, Julian?” She called.
“Yeah?”
“I know it’s my turn to cook, but I could really go for one of your steaks tonight…”
He chuckled and stood up. “Okay, I can do that.”
As he headed for the freezer to grab a couple of steaks for defrosting, Xiù gently ran her nails across Allison’s scalp. “That bad?”
Allison closed her eyes, enjoying the sensation. “You and a piece of steel have a lot in common,” she said. When Xiù paused, confused, she opened her eyes again and explained. “I can’t bullshit either of you. Either I’m welding it right or it breaks. Either my stance is right, or you correct me. It’s… frustrating.”
Xiù gave her a quick reassuring kiss. “You’re doing great,” she promised.
It occurred to her after the fact that it was the first time she’d actually kissed Allison, rather than being kissed by her. Al certainly didn’t fail to notice – she smiled hugely and relaxed. “Mm… Thanks,” she whispered. “I needed that.”
“More head scritchies?” Xiù offered.
“…Please…”
Xiù obliged, and, on a whim, whispered something for Allison alone to hear. “Wǒ ài nǐ.”
Allison stretched like a sleepy kitten. “Mmm…I dunno what that meant, but it sounded good.”
Xiù smiled. “It was,” she promised.
Date Point 10y7m AV
Michael Foale High School, Folctha, Cimbrean, The Far Reaches
Adam Arés
Despite being a headteacher in charge of a few hundred pupils rather than the homeroom tutor in charge of just a handful as she’d been when Adam had been in her class, Jess had never got around to selecting a different look for the workplace. Long skirt, black cardigan, red scarf. It was her working uniform, and so iconic that whenever the kids wanted to poke affectionate fun at her, they never needed to work hard at it.
Possibly that was why Jess had stuck with the distinctive look. She had a policy of not taking herself too seriously at work, though she took the work very seriously indeed.
“Thanks for doing this, Adam.”
“Like I said, de nada. I hope I can help…”
Used as he was to the narrow hallways and corridors of HMS Sharman’s administrative building, Adam was still feeling self-consciously huge as he followed his stepmom. Everything was just a little low, teenager-height or lower, and next to Jess’ slim, avian figure he was well aware that he cut a near-freakish figure.
He tried not to let it bother him when two wide-eyed girls in the school’s uniform of a light powder-blue polo shirt with a grey sweater stood aside to let them past, and then dashed away laughing and whispering to each other.
Jack Tisdale was lounging around in an empty classrom with his feet up on a desk, radiating dishevelled contempt for frivolities like the uniform. He’d found a tennis ball somewhere, and was bouncing it off the wall when they entered. Jess just sighed and confiscated it, even as Jack straightened up and adjusted his clothes, aware that something different was going on.
“…I’ll leave you two to talk,” Jess said, and made herself scarce.
Adam would have liked to sit down, but he was innately wary of furniture nowadays. None of the plastic seats were either large or strong enough. He settled for leaning against the door and folding his arms.
Jack stared at him for several long minutes. “…Jesus, Adam,” he declared at last. “Ava said you got big, but…”
“Yeah.”
“…Why are you here?”
Adam tilted his head. “To help out a friend.”
“Oh, what, Jess needs your help with the naughty kid?” Jack made a frustrated noise and stood up. He only looked rail-thin, Adam realised. On closer inspection he was carrying some respectable muscle definition on that skinny frame. It was doubtful he’d ever be strong, but he was certainly not as weak as a first glance might suggest. But he wasn’t strong either, as the scabbed wounds on his lip and eyebrow attested.
“Jess isn’t my friend, man. She’s my step-mom.”
“…We hardly know each other, we’re not friends.” Jack snapped, dismissively.
“Bullshit.”
Before Jack could reply, he’d been grabbed and pulled irresistibly into an Adam Arés Trademarked Hug. Not even Baseball could escape those.
“Get off! Get… Leggo! Got off me you big-Aagh!” Jack squirmed, fought, pushed, twisted and at one stage Adam guessed he maybe even tried biting.
Then he went still.
Then, very slowly, he hugged back.
Date Point 10y7m AV
The Box, Omaha, Nebraska, USA, Earth
Allison Buehler
The treadmill in their living space was, cleverly, part of the couch. A hidden catch on the side of the couch allowed for the squishy-sitty-bit (as Xiù had named it) to be rolled back into the wall, revealing the treadmill’s deck, the handholds and controls of which simply lifted upwards and clicked into place.
Julian hated it. But then again, Julian disliked exercising full stop – he’d always kept in shape through labor, be it splitting firewood, clearing brush, landscape management, hunting, whatever. The need to actually put dedicated time and effort into his fitness was one he accepted, but that didn’t mean he had to like it. Allison routinely had to order him onto the treadmill, or to pick up his weights.
She usually wound up doing her yoga practice nearby so as to encourage him.
The new titanium reinforcement in his foot turned out to have been such a minor change in the weight and balance of it that he’d adapted inside a day or two, much to his embarrassment, and it had improved his running gait impressively. Before, he’d had a kind of shuffling, cautious stride that favored his prosthetic and minimized the impact on its fragile synthetic “bones”.
With that concern repaired, he new loped along with a fluid, easy, toe-first stride that made surprisingly little noise, and he could keep it up all day.
Xiù meanwhile was showing off her disgusting core strength by doing one-arm toes-to-bar sets.
She wasn’t actually showing it off of course – that was an ordinary part of her routine – but every time Allison watched her do it, she felt a little inadequate. Her own fitness had improved dramatically under Dane’s guidance, and she could do toes-to-bar sets herself, but the one-handed ones just eluded her. She wound up swinging like a rung bell, whereas Xiù’s movement was smooth, controlled and precise.
Then of course there was the other part of their training day – station drills. The Box would occasionally produce one of four chimes, summoning one or all of them to their workstations. The idea being that no matter what you were in the middle of, you downed tools immediately, pausing only for fire safety or other danger concerns, and went straight to work.
The worst ones were when they went off at night.
Xiù let go of the bar the second her chime went off, gave them both a wave, and headed for her simulator with her sports drink in hand, toweling herself.
“Wanna bet we get an all stations chime in five minutes?” Allison asked, pushing her arms forward and her leg out into the Warrior III position.
“You’re on. Bathroom cleaning.”
“Urgh… take-back?” Allison hated cleaning the shower. It inevitably meant digging a sodden wad of dark hair that could have belonged to either Julian or Xiù – probably both – out of the drain trap.
“Not on your life.”
Allison sighed, breathed through her position for half a minute, then returned to a lunge. “Fine. You can clean the air filter then.” She said. Another of her ‘favorite’ jobs – the air filter in the actual ship would be there to extract dust from their atmosphere before it was processed through the life support system. The simulated one was full of icing sugar and glitter instead. Somebody in their simulation team had a sense of sadistic humor.
“Fair.” Julian conceded.
“Oh, hey, seeing as she’s not here…” Allison began.
“No complaining about Xiù behind her back, remember?” Julian said.
“No complaining, I swear!” Allison objected. “She just…”
“What?”
“D’you know what ’Wo ai ni’ means?” Allison asked.
Julian turned his head slightly. “She said that to you?”
“Yeah…?”
Julian smiled warmly. “It means ’I love you’.”
“…That’s what I thought.”
“Is that a big deal? She’s said it before.” Julian pointed out.
“She’s said she loves us before. ’I love you guys’, you know? This one was for me personally.”
“So what’s the problem?”
Allison returned to a neutral stance and shook her limbs off. Now that the bar was vacant, it was her turn on it.
“It’s not a problem, it’s… I mean, you’re fine. Two girls, woohoo, right?”
“I guess…” Julian said, cautiously.
“Meanwhile for me it’s been like, ’surprise, Allison! You’re gay now!’ which is… that takes some adjusting to,” she sighed. “I’m not complaining, it’s great. But I kinda feel off-balance about it sometimes, you know?”
“You’ve really committed to it though. Got that cute butch haircut and everything…” Julian grinned evilly at her.
She ripped one of her sweatbands off her wrist and threw it at him. “This is not a butch haircut, you ass!”
In an impressive display of coordination, without breaking stride he juggled and caught it after it bounced off his shoulder. “You’re the ass, you butt,” he retorted, tossing it back to her with a laugh.
She threw it at him again. “You’re the butt, dummy!”
The sweatband ping-ponged between them. “Am not!”
“Are too!”
“Nuh-uh!”
Laughing, Allison slipped the sweatband back onto her wrist. “Come over here and call me a butt to my face!”
He shook his head, still grinning. “No ma’am.”
She gasped, mock-scandalized. “Bad boy! How dare you not call me a butt?!”
“We need to finish our exercise or they’ll fail us and we won’t go to space,” he pointed out. “I don’t have time to call you a butt!”
She feigned grumbling. “Damn you and your… Sensible-ness.”
He chuckled. “You can punish me later.”
“I can, huh?” Allison gave him an appraising up-and-down.
“Well, I’m already cleaning that air filter for you, so I’m gonna be covered in glitter anyway…” He pointed out.
“Oh, now you’re just inviting me to be cruel.” Allison said.
“You gonna actually exercise anytime today?” Julian asked, cheekily earning himself at least a one-point hike in that evening’s punishment.
“Fine, but you’re gonna regret taunting me, mister.”
He snorted. “Promises, promises…”
Date Point 10y7m AV
Michael Foale High School, Folctha, Cimbrean, The Far Reaches
Adam Arés
“…like I’m this fragile, this… glass child that they’ve got to protect! Like they think I’m stupid enough to get myself shot too! You know?”
Adam nodded. The Trademarked Hug had worked its magic yet again, but the real trick was listening. He listened, he nodded, he let Jack get it out of his system. Really, all he’d done was to, as Sikes had once described it to him, unlock the paddock and let the colt run until it got tired.
All he had to do now was sit cross-legged on the floor, listen, and throw away everything he thought of saying. It wouldn’t do to try and talk Jack’s problems out, not yet. The poor guy was a crackling Tesla coil of anger with no clue where that anger should go. Now that it was spilling out of him, it was earthing itself everywhere, in the school, in Adam, in the world in general, in his parents, and in his late sister.
Adam could relate. After the first few hours of simply not being able to believe what had happened, he’d been furious with Sara. He’d felt guilty about it for a while, until he’d learned about the stages of grief and how anger was a natural part of the progression. One that Jack appeared to have got himself stuck on, and all of that energy needed to dissipate before anything Adam might say would be constructive.
Besides. Some of the things he was saying were painful to hear, and even managed to make Adam a bit angry, they hit so close to home.
But Adam was good at staying quiet, controlling his expression and listening.
Jack finished his tirade by hooking a foot under one of the classroom chairs and kicking it across the room.
“…Why am I even telling you this? You can’t even relate, can you? You’ve got your shit sorted out.”
A direct question got a direct answer. “Nah man. I’ve not got my shit sorted out at all.”
“Come off it!” Jack gave him an exasperated stare. “Look at you! You’re on TV escorting Gaoians and you’re meant to be, like, this badass super-soldier or whatever and you’re… I mean, how fucking strong are you?”
“Honestly? Bro, I’m the strongest man alive.”
“See?!”
“Dude. Do you know how fucked in the head you have to be to even try to become what I am? It feels great, but the price I pay is constant pain, not bein’ able to trust the furniture, I have the worst time finding clothes that fit, and I have to eat chicken and rice with supplements every goddamned hour.” He gestured to the meal tote he was carrying with him to make the point. “Does that really sound like I’ve got my shit together?
“Whatever.” Jack flung himself into a chair and sulked some more.
Adam decided to change tack. “…Okay. Let’s say I do have it all sorted out,” he said. “I’ll give you that one. Let’s say I do. Man, I’m not asking for pity here or anything, but you know what kinda shit I went through. Ain’t no way anybody could blame me for being a complete fuckup, so why d’you think I’m not?”
“I dunno. Maybe you’re just special. Maybe you’re just lucky.”
That one got under Adam’s skin. ’Lucky’? If there was any one word that simply didn’t fit his life, ’Lucky’ was it.
He was still working on restoring his calm when Jack surprised him by wiping his eyes and clarifying. “I try,” he said. “I thought perhaps I could… at least get strong, like Dad, or like you. Something. But I can’t even do that. Every time Dad goes to the gym I go with him, and after all this time I’m still this skinny, weak piece of nothing…”
“Bet you can swim like a fish, though,” Adam observed. “Me, I sink like a stone nowadays.”
“Great. I can swim.” Contempt for that particular blessing oozed from every syllable.
Adam had to laugh a little. He would have liked to point out that swimming was a vital skill for a PJ, and that having sacrificed his buoyancy on the altar of raw strength he’d never properly dive again, which meant that he’d never again be a proper pararescueman. But, he was conscientiously trying to talk about Jack rather than himself. “Don’t knock it! Swimming is fuckin’ useful, bro!”
This did not seem persuasive to Jack, so he tried a slightly different angle.
“…Y’know… one of the people I admire the most is one of our NCOs. She ain’t big, she ain’t strong, she can’t do any of the shit I do. Her deadlift is, like, my hammer curl.”
Jack gave him the classic sulky teenage look. “…And?”
“And I can’t do any of the shit she can do.” Adam sat forward to make sure he was selling the point. “It’s not about what you can’t do, manito. Everybody in the world can’t do pretty much everything! It’s about figuring what you can do.”
“What if what I can do is useless?”
“No such thing.”
Jack snorted skeptically.
“No, really!” Adam insisted. “My CO, he talks about the speartip. How me and the guys, we’re the sharp bit right at the end, and that’s the bit everyone’s scared of. Nobody ever thinks of being the long bit of wood behind that, but I tell you what, man: if you took the speartip off the end of that long bit of wood, all you’d have is just a crappy knife.”
“So what can I do, Adam?” Jack asked.
“Bro, you’ve got game. No, listen-” Adam raised his hand to shut off Jack’s sarcastic interjection. “Game counts for fuckin’ everything. You don’t just want to make a difference in life, you need to. Right?”
Slowly and cautiously, Jack nodded.
“Dude, I can’t just relate to that, that is… literally my whole life,” Adam told him. “It’d eat me up too if I thought there was nothing I could do, but there is. You just gotta find your direction and head that way. Guys like me, we ain’t lucky, we’re just a shitty-ass knife. It’s everybody else who makes us work.”
Jack was silent for a long time. “…You really think I could do something?” he asked, at long last.
“Dude. You’ve got the kind of dedication that can do anything. You just need to figure out where to point it.”
“…Could I… join the SOR?”
Adam took a deep breath. “For real? You won’t be an operator, and even if you could be I’d tell you no. Be smart and leave that shit for the dumb fucks like me! But man, I reckon you’d make a kick-ass support tech, and without the techs there wouldn’t be an SOR.”
Jack pushed his glasses up his nose and nodded thoughtfully.
“Tell you what,” Adam offered. “You decide you wanna do this? I’ll talk with your mom and dad and we’ll get you on a training plan. I reckon we could surprise you. And you’d need to study really hard, there’s a lotta learning for a tech.” He paused to consider, “Marty could prolly help a lot. She’s, like, at least as smart as I am strong. Hell, I’d bet she’d love to help! She’d be a hard teacher though…think you could handle it?”
“…Maybe.”
“No fuckin’ maybe,” Adam corrected him. “Either you set a goal and try, or you don’t. So here’s your’ fuckin’ goal, okay? Prove you’re worth my time. No more fights, no more making your teachers’ lives hell, you take all that anger and you put it to work.”
“…Can you teach me how to fight properly?”
“Heh,” Adam chuckled, but he saw himself in that question and sobered quickly.
“I can,” he said. “When you earn it.”
Date Point 10y7m AV
The Box, Omaha, Nebraska, USA, Earth
Xiù Chang
The “Yes ma’am” game was Xiù’s guilty thrill. Saying it, having it said to her, didn’t matter – it was fun.
Julian and Allison sometimes took it to another level, though.
Xiù would be the first to acknowledge that her experience with human sexuality was mostly theoretical. In fact, she would have said that she knew more about Gaoian sexuality than her own species’, were it not for the fact that Gaoians were so straightforward that describing their mating urges as “sexuality” was basically inaccurate.
This had been the inevitable cause of some difficulty when Xiù’s precious stash of Earth media – the one that Ayma had purchased for her – had turned out to include the film version of “Fifty Shades of Grey.”
Ayma and Regaari had naturally wanted to know why Xiù didn’t want to watch it with them, and had put on a fascinating display of bewildered ear-semaphore as she had squirmed, stammered and blushed her way through explaining the concept of BDSM – a subject on which she was scarcely better-educated than the Gaoians – and erotica in general.
What Al and Julian got up to wasn’t BDSM, or at least not as Xiù understood it. Neither of them seemed remotely interested in ropes, whips or silly toys. What they were interested in was that they would occasionally turn the “yes ma’am” game up to eleven and Julian would put his absolute faith and trust in Allison. He would invite her to use him, and Allison would obey.
What Xiù had noticed was that ‘obey’ was entirely the correct description. Despite the apparently subservient role he enjoyed playing, Julian was the one with the real power in their relationship: He could stop the game instantly with a word, and that was true in day-to-day life as well as in their intense sessions. He liked to pretend he was a meek and submissive plaything of his girls’…But every so often, when he was tired, stressed or horny, she caught a glimpse of the wary, wily, dangerous wolf of a man who lived under that sanguine exterior, playing at being a lapdog. A little scary and a lot exciting.
The problem Julian and Allison had run into was that the total lack of privacy and the multiple showers in their daily routines meant that nudity had completely lost its sting for all of them, even for Xiù. This had robbed Allison of a powerful tool for playing the game that Julian wanted to play, and their constant proximity had robbed them of space to push into new and more thrilling territory without violating Xiù’s comfort zones.
Now, that problem seemed to have reached a tipping point.
“So he dared you extra hard?”
Allison watched Julian thoughtfully. For now, he was still trying to comb glitter out of his hair, while the girls had a quiet conversation, pitched low enough that he shouldn’t be able to hear. “Babe, I love you… but Julian and I have had WAY less sex since you came along. We’re both horny as shit.”
“So have sex!” Xiù hissed. “We’ve been over this, I want you guys to.”
“Yeah but… we all nest down on the floor every night together.” Allison pointed out. “ It doesn’t feel right, banishing you back to your bunk…”
“Al…” Xiù touched her own forehead. “We’ve got to try and make this stuff normal for all our sakes. I want you two to have a healthy sex life even if I never manage.”
“You think you never will?”
Xiù shook her head emphatically. “No, I will. I will. I just need to ease into it, that’s all.”
Allison nibbled thoughtfully on a fingernail. “…Babe, what is it about sex that makes you so nervous?” She asked.
Xiù just turned her head and touched a finger to the scar on her throat.
“…I’ve been wondering where you got that,” Allison confessed. “What happened?”.
Xiù knew her expression had gone cold. “This is where Zane had me against a wall, with a knife to my throat, and a hand… you know what? It doesn’t matter where his hand was – I didn’t want it there.”
“Jesus, baby….”
“It doesn’t matter.” Xiù repeated. “I love Julian, I trust him completely. But there’s nothing that kills my mood faster than flashing back to that moment…”
“No wonder you kicked that fucker’s ass like you did.”
“He deserved worse.” Xiù growled, and meant it.
“So does Julian… remind you of that?”
“Sometimes. When he’s…” Xiù glanced at their boyfriend, who’d apparently decided that he’d de-glittered himself as much as he practically could, and had now settled on his bunk to read a book. She lowered her voice to make sure he couldn’t hear. “…When he gets intense. You know? When he gives you that… hungry look?”
“…That’s when he’s sexiest!” Allison objected.
“Yeah!” Xiù agreed. “That’s the problem.”
“…Mixed signals?” Allison guessed. “It turns you on and takes you back at the same time?”
“Right.”
Julian looked up from his book. “Are you talking about me behind my back?” He asked.
“Let us scheme in peace, you!” Allison told him, with a grin. He chuckled and returned to his reading with a ‘yes ma’am’ and Allison treated Xiù to a wink.
A thought seemed to strike her. “What about me?”
“What about you?” Xiù asked.
“Do you have the same problem with me?”
Xiù shook her head. “No…?”
“Well, if you’re not ready for him…”
Xiù got what she was driving at and laughed. “Um… Al… I love listening to you and him. I think I’d like to watch sometime, and I want you to be there when I’m finally ready…And I really do love you… but I think I’m still basically straight.”
“I know, I know…” Allison agreed. “I know what you mean. I think I’m still basically straight too… but I am curious to know what it’s like.”
Xiù laughed. “You’re incorrigible!”
“Just so long as you’re encourage-able.” Allison punned.
Xiù laughed some more, then quietened. “I guess?” She hazarded. “My life’s been so strange, I never know what’s going to happen next – Let’s face it, weirder things have happened to me.”
“You were abducted by aliens, you’re legally a Gaoian, and now you’re training to fly a spaceship.” Allison nodded. “I’m just saying, next to all that…”
“I’m not saying ‘no’.” Xiù hastened to tell her. “I’m just saying… let me work up to it. Okay?”
”More than fair.” Allison smiled.
“Still…” Xiù put a finger to her cheek and stared thoughtfully in Julian’s direction.
“What?”
“I dunno… I’m just thinking that perhaps I should start taking charge. Like… I didn’t get better at my fitness, my gung fu, my piloting or at learning Gaori by just sitting back and wishing it would happen, did I?”
“You’re right.” Allison agreed. “And it’ll be the same with your sex life, babe. If you want to have one, you’re gonna have to work on it… crawl-walk-run, right?”
Xiù reached a decision.
“Okay.”
Allison’s eyebrow arched upwards. “Okay?”
“Okay… let’s work on it.”
Looking distinctly like the cat who’d just talked a mouse out of its hole, Allison sat forward and ran her tongue across her teeth. “…What do you have in mind?” She asked.